Matthew Stavros Web Portal

I'm an urban historian at the University of Sydney and the author of Kyoto: An Urban History of Japan’s Premodern Capital (U Hawaii P, 2014). My research focuses primarily on the urban and architectural history of Japan and East Asia to 1800, with interests extending to religion, material culture, and monumentalism in East and Southeast Asia. My current book projects explores the influence of South and Southeast Asian symbolism in 14th premodern Japan.

I trained in architectural and urban history at Kyoto University and completed a PhD at Princeton University. I teach on all periods of history and historiography, research methods in Asian Studies, Sino-Japanese diplomatics, and more broadly on the histories and cultures of East Asia and Southeast Asia. I’m a native of Michigan and dual citizen of the United States and Australia.